Joseph J. Fuller Collection

Manuscripts Collection 104

Overview of the Collection

Repository:

G. W. Blunt White Library, Mystic Seaport

Creator:

Fuller, Joseph J., 1839-1920

Title:

Joseph J. Fuller Collection

Dates:

1880-1920

Extent:

3 volumes

Abstract:

This collection consists of 2 diary-type volumes and 1 scrapbook relative to the career of Joseph J. Fuller, a whaling and sealing ship master from New London, CT. Of singular importance are accounts of the time Fuller and the crew of the New London Sealing Schooner PILOTS BRIDE were shipwrecked on Kerguelen Island for nearly one year. (See also coll.25 and Log 771)

Identification:

Coll. 104

Biography of Joseph J. Fuller

Joseph J. Fuller (1839-1920), originally from Danvers, Massachusetts, was a whaling and sealing captain who sailed out of New London, Connecticut, during the last half of the 19th century. He eventually specialized in the branch of this industry that hunted sea elephants for oil, principally at Heard and Kerguelen “Desolation” Islands in the Indian Ocean. In 1880 Fuller was wrecked at Desolation and spent a year there with a mutinous crew, under conditions in which differences of language, race, and color exacerbated a normally harsh existence. (For further information see Joseph J. Fuller, “Master of Desolation: The Reminiscences of Capt. Joseph J. Fuller,” edited by Briton Cooper Busch, Mystic, Conn., 1980.)

Restrictions

Index Terms

This collection is indexed under the following headings in the catalog of the G. W. Blunt White Library. Researchers desiring materials about related topics, persons or places should search the catalog using these headings.